Chapter Two: Home
Miss Frizzle sat at a desk in her classroom in Walkerville Elementary with a stack of papers and a red pen. The school day had ended, but there were still plenty of school-related things to do… namely, marking, four folders of which sat on her desk.
It had been, what, three years since she had come to Walkerville? She'd spent the first year becoming acquainted with the area, gathering the necessary paperwork before becoming a teacher at the school in the second. That year, she had been placed in charge of Grade Two, with half of her students being moved into a second Grade Three class when school began the next September (which, she was quick to point out to anyone that asked, had not been her fault, despite letters from several concerned parents; it had been the result of increased registration instead).
The students that remained— Arnold, Carlos, Dorothy Ann, Keesha, Ralphie, Tim and Wanda— had been joined by Phoebe, a transfer student from another school in Walkerville (the name of which she couldn't recall). It made things easier, having a smaller class, especially when they went on field trips, and if complications arose, Liz, her pet lizard (well, not really "pet") could handle the situation until she figured something out.
Her eyes scanned the contents of the first folder before her. English. A hit-and-miss course, as far as her class was concerned.
Taking up her pen with a sigh, she began the long, arduous task of grading. This job wasn't as bad as some made it seem… it was just the homework that scared most people off.
-
Louise Winters, the school receptionist, put down her book and looked up at the strange man who had just walked by her desk near the front doors of the school. The man looked like he knew where he was headed, but she decided to stop him just in case. You could never tell who was crazy and who wasn't, Louise thought to herself, especially after that incident in Scotland. What was it again?
"Excuse me, sir," she said, "but can I help you?"
The man blinked. "Oh, um, sure. I was wondering if you could tell me where Ms. Frizzle's classroom is? I'm from the school board," he added, flashing a piece of paper that read James McCrimmon, Walkerville School Division. Louise nodded.
"Certainly, sir. Ms. Frizzle's class is down the hall, fourth door on the left."
The man was already gone. Louise was about to settle back into reading Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood (it had been recommended by her book club) when a thought struck her.
Dunblane. The name of it was Dunblane.
To make matters worse, she had noticed a peculiar shape in one of Mr. McCrimmon's pockets. It had resembled a pen, and could have been just that, but after Dunblane, well, you never knew…
--
"Sir! Sir!"
The Doctor wheeled around to see the receptionist from before— what was her name again? Thelma? —standing in front of him, breathing heavily, with a sheepish smile on her face.
"Excuse me, sir," she said, inhaling and exhaling. "I just— I just remembered… Mrs. Frizzle isn't in today. She went home early."
"But her classroom is just up here," the Doctor said, gesturing towards the other end of the hallway. "You said so."
She inhaled. "I know. I'm sorry, sir. I was caught up in a book I was reading, and…"
"Oh, it's no bother," the Doctor said quickly as he began to walk down the hallway to the front desk. "Which book were you reading?"
"Alias Grace, by Margaret Atwood."
"Sounds like a good read. You should get back to that. By the way," he called from his position by the front doors, "what was your name?"
"Louise, sir. Louise Winters."
"Good name, Louise. I like people named Louise. Good night, Louise. Stay away from the Grand Canyon, now."
"Certainly, sir," Louise said, utterly perplexed as Mr. McCrimmon strode through the doors. "You have a good night too."
She returned to her desk and began packing up. Tonight had been the strangest night in all five years she'd been secretary at Walkerville Elementary, and she just wanted to go home.
Home, she decided as she pushed the glass front doors open into the cool October air, was probably the safest place for anyone to be at the moment.
-
"So, what did you do at school today, Tim?"
Tim's mother raised a forkful of curled spaghetti and smiled at her son from across the table. He shifted in his seat at the other end of their circular table.
"Not anything exciting, really," he said. "Just schoolwork."
"Your class seems to go on field trips quite often," his father said, glancing at Tim from his chair between his wife and son. "Have you gone on any recently?"
"Just once," Tim said, taking a sip of water. "We went to the supermarket. Mrs. Frizzle showed us fish and we figured out if they were freshwater or saltwater."
"That's very interesting, son," his father said. "What else can you tell us about the super—"
The doorbell rang.
"I'll get it," Tim said, being careful to get out of his chair as slowly as possible, and walked through the dining room and kitchen to the front door. He opened it.
It was Dorothy Ann, wearing a pale blue sweater and holding a thick, leather-bound book in her hands.
"D.A.!" he said, and then stepped outside to join her on the front step. "What are you doing here?"
"I was doing some research at the library before it closed, and I found something you might be interested in."
"Can it wait?" Tim said, glancing at the front door. "I'm eating dinner."
"Can you tell your parents I'll just be a minute?" she said. "Tell them we're studying together or something."
"I don't know," he said. "I'll have to check."
He slipped through the door before D.A. could say another word.
-
Tim found the dining room exactly as he'd left it— three glasses, three forks, three half-eaten plates of spaghetti— with one exception: his parents. All he could hear was murmurs coming from the end of the hallway that led to the bedrooms.
"Mom? Dad?" he called, walking down the carpeted hallway towards its end: the master bedroom. He'd never been allowed to go in there alone— why, he didn't know.
The murmurs were stronger now. Tim crept closer and put his ear to the bedroom door.
"Just lay off her, alright?" That was a higher voice, probably his mother.
"Are you kidding me?" the deeper voice of his father said. "Tim has been going on field trips all the time and we haven't signed one permission slip. What do you make of that?"
"I don't know," his mother said, sounding wearied. "It's only her second year at Walkerville Elementary. What do you expect?"
"You're right. It's her second year at Walkerville Elementary. That gives her no excuse for her behavior. No self-respecting teacher would organize a field trip without notifying the parents!"
"So what do you want to do? Get her fired?"
"Do you see any other solution?"
"Andrew," his mother said, exasperated, "listen to me. You're going too far. I'm sure Mrs. Frizzle has her reasons."
"Oh yeah, and she had her 'reasons' last year too! We both know that the Grade Threes weren't split up this year because of some stupid 'increase in registration'. It was to keep those kids away from her!"
"You're talking nonsense. I spoke to Amanda's mom over the phone last week, and she seemed fine—"
"—Aside from the weekly sessions with a psychiatrist, yeah."
"Now, we don't know if Mrs. Frizzle is the cause of that—"
"Then explain Amanda's constant babbling about going inside pipes at the waterworks. Traveling through the nose. Landing on Mars!"
"Amanda always struck me as being a little, well, odd."
"But not like that! Do you see what she's done to these kids? She's traumatizing them!"
"No need to raise your voice, Andrew," his mother said, and Tim suddenly felt as if the temperature in the bedroom had dropped considerably. "We'll discuss this later. I would advise you to not, by any means, act on your suspicions until we have considerable proof. Is that clear?"
"Yes, dear."
"And what are we going to do now?"
"Go back to the dining room and pretend like nothing has happened."
"Excellent."
Tim got up and raced down the hall, his heart pounding, slid into his chair and twirled some spaghetti around his fork as his parents left the master bedroom and entered the dining room.
"Mom, Dad," Tim said, "D.A. wants to know if she can come in for a few minutes. We're studying."
"That sounds great, honey," his mother said, smiling warmly but, at the same time, sending chills down Tim's spine. "That sounds great."
He left his chair and hurried down the hallway.
-
"Thanks for letting me in," D.A. said ten minutes later, sitting on Tim's bed as he sat at his computer desk. "What took you so long?"
"Oh, nothing," Tim said, feeling guilty as he fiddled with a pencil.
"That's good. I want you to see what I found in this book."
Tim stood up from his desk and joined D.A. on the bed. She placed the book face-up on her lap, and Tim could see the book was called A History of Walkerville, Volume 3: 1980 and Onward.
"I've never seen this book before," he said. D.A. smiled.
"It's not exactly the sort of thing kids our age would be reading. I had to ask Mrs. Cole to fetch it for me from one of the top shelves."
She began flipping through pages. "Most of it's boring, just elections and stuff, until we get to the family histories at the back of the book. Here."
She had stopped at one page, near the back of the book, with a picture of a tall, handsome man and a shorter, blonde-haired woman smiling and embracing in front of a house.
"Listen to this," she said, and began to read.
"The Smith Family: John and Marion Smith. John Smith married Marion Prentice in the summer of 1985 and the two moved to Walkerville later that year. John Smith—"
"John Smith? I thought he was a character in Pocahontas."
"Maybe," D.A. said. "Listen."
"—bought the house on Cleveland Road as a present for Marion. The two do not have any plans for children at the moment, but hope to start a family in the future."
She pointed at the picture at the top of the page. "Who does John Smith look like to you?" Tim studied the picture for a moment before his eyes widened.
"It's the man," he said. "The man in the trenchcoat!"
He sat up. "But that's impossible… this picture was taken in the 1980s. There's no way this is him. They look exactly the same!"
"Exactly," D.A. said, closing A History of Walkerville, Volume 3 shut. "We need to find out more about this John Smith, and about this Marion Prentice too."
"But how?"
"Oh, don't worry," D.A. said, smiling in a way most unlike herself. "I have a plan."
--
Based on what I can remember, Amanda was one of the original students in the classic Magic School Bus book series. It's always fun to throw in references like that.
What's D.A.'s plan? Find out next time on The Walkerville Visitation!
